5 Forex Trading Strategies

5 Forex Trading Strategies

If you’re new to trading currencies online and unsure where to start, it helps to understand popular forex trading strategies. Forex comparison site ForexBrokersAZ.com discusses 5 Forex trading styles in detail.

Scalping

Scalping involves buying and selling currency pairs online in small high frequency trades.

It’s designed to capitalize on small changes in exchange rates typically between 5 and 15 pips. A scalper can spend hours on end monitoring the markets, pushing trades through within minutes of closing a previous trade. The best trade opportunities arise when the foreign exchange markets become active – typically around news events, data releases or when trading sessions overlap across international markets.

Stock chart showing levels of support (4,5,6, 7, and 8) and resistance (1, 2, and 3); levels of resistance tend to become levels of support and vice versa. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Make no mistake, scalping isn’t for Forex trading beginners. It requires a strong understand of the Forex markets and a clear view on where the markets are going. For this reason, scalpers usually trade with brokers that offer Electronic Communication Networks – also known as ECN brokers – because these brokers deliver faster execution and can provide insights into where the markets are heading through ‘Depth of Market’ (DoM) tools. DoM sounds technical but it’s nothing more than a window onto the orderbook, with volume and price information about buy and sell orders.

Day trading

Day trading involves opening and closing a Forex trading position on the same day – before 5pm New York time. The best day trading opportunities arise over the course of the European and US sessions. Liquidity reaches its peak when these sessions overlap.

Day trading opportunities can be found using intra-day charts with medium timeframes ranging anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes to 1 to 2 hours. Most day traders perform technical analysis on charts to identity support and resistance levels and other patterns.

If this is your preferred trading style, you’ll want to familiarize yourself with the MetaTrader 4 (MT4) platform. It comes loaded with of indicators you can use to perform technical analysis. Click here for Forex brokers that support the MetaTrader 4 platform.

Swing trading

Swing trades unravel over a longer period of time, typically 2 to 5 days with a view to make a 100 to 250 pip mark-up. Swing traders uncover trading opportunities through charts, using technical analysis to identify support and resistance levels and other patterns in the data.

Position trading

Positing traders have an even longer investment horizon: they typically keep their positions open anywhere between 5 and 50 days with a view to make a 250 to 1,000 pip profit. This is where the frontier between technical and fundamental analysis blurs as position traders can use both tactics to uncover trade ideas.

Value investing

Last but not least, value investors such as Warren Buffet or Benjamin Graham have a long term investment horizon. They can hold their positions anywhere from 1 month to several years if they spot a long term trend. Value investors can use both fundamental and technical analysis to identify potential trade ideas. However, longer term considerations such as economic imbalances, interest rate differentials and geo-political considerations often come into play.